Breaking Idleness
by Svetlaena Quel'Ivan
Summary: Watching the Blight end had changed Nels Llendo a bit, and he liked to think it was mostly for the better. *One-shot. Based in the Adarise Salvel saga but can stand alone.*


Nels Llendo had never been much for prayer, and typically avoided the uptight, morally rigid culture of the Temple, but something drew him here today, and there was no threat of imprisonment to stop him.

Watching the Blight's end had changed him a bit, and he liked to think it was mostly for the better. Suddenly it hadn't seemed so fun to take people's purses at dagger-point anymore. A year of honest work later, his hefty fines were fully paid off. He could do as he pleased, no longer toiling in the fields, but back to running the roads he knew and loved, now as a courier.

But there were no messages to be delivered today. Everything had gone quiet once word reached Morrowind of the destruction of Kvatch. And now there was talk of sightings on the roads and the Dunmer, still wary and vigilant after the Blight, were preparing for the worst. Bored with sitting around the Cornerclub and waiting for customers that probably weren't coming, Nels had taken to the streets of Balmora, and his idle wandering had delivered him to the Temple's door. Still unsure of why he was there, he sighed, ran a hand through crimson locks and went in.

The priests gave him a smile and a nod but kept about their business, and he liked it that way. Years of living alone on the roads had left him terrible at small talk, and with no fondness for it. Sandals and cloak were left by the door in respect as Nels proceeded into the dim chamber. Candles that burned with violet and red and azure flames were the only light, casting bizarre and flickering shadows across the room. Even in that light he could see the seal where the old shrine had been torn out and replaced with the new one. Azura, Mephala and Boethiah were depicted where the False Gods had once stood.

The rogue remembered vaguely feeling... dull when the truth had been explained to him. He had respected the Tribunal, even though worship was something he just couldn't bring himself to do. Even though he didn't share the zealotry many of his kinsmen did, it still left him in shock to hear the real story of their treacherous ascension to godhood, but the more he'd thought on it the more he knew it to be true. Besides, he had heard it from a very credible source.

Stranger still was walking around, knowing all this, when no one else did and even speaking it would be considered madness at best and blasphemy at worst. Nels had heard the truth and from that day onward the world just looked different. Everything he heard and saw near the Temples entered a frightening context and it was all he could do to keep his mouth shut. And when the word had started to spread of a true Nerevarine, and the proof stacked higher and higher against the Temple, they became as a cornered dog. At one point, Ordinators had sought him out for 'questioning', though their attempts to find him were laughable at best.

So from that standpoint, the Dunmer thought to himself, he should be happier to see them replaced by the gods of his ancestors than he felt. Something still felt wrong. That feeling had started after the Blight. Nels had hoped it was just an uncertainty, or that he was just not used to the changes yet. But seven years later the discomfort still hadn't passed. Crossing his arms over one another he remained loitering in the back of the room, enviously watching a small group of locals pray to the three Good Daedra. If only peace were so easy for him to come by. Rather than joining the small group the rogue moved off to the side, and his eye caught the row of Saints. Idly he began to pace it.

Saint Veloth the Pilgrim, the patron of seekers and outcasts, the one who had led the Chimer to Resdayn in ancient times. Every Dark Elf knew that name from a young age. Saint Almalexia, the Healing Mother, one of the False Tribunal and now merely a Saint. Nels frowned, but kept on, avoiding looking at that one too long. Meris, the peacemaker... Olms the Just... and then his footsteps stopped in front of a Shrine that he was certain he hadn't seen like this before. Parchment draped over the stone depicted a Dunmer woman in robes, a flaming sword in one hand and a Moon and Star in the palm of the other.

Saint Nerevar the Valorous.

Nels became conscious of the beaded earring dangling from one of his lobes and reached up to idly touch it. Seven years. Had it really been so long? And yet, when he closed his eyes, he could no longer clearly remember her face. While people were mostly wondering where Vivec and Almalexia had gone, the Nerevarine's disappearance slipped under the radar until sometime later.

But Nels had known. Just like before he had been left with knowledge no one else had or wanted, even though it affected them all. And eventually, people did ask. They had been seen together in Pelagiad often enough, and he would just shrug and say he didn't know, which was at least half of the truth.

There were times when he wondered what would have been if he'd taken her offer to sail away, and this was one of them, as he knelt before the Shrine and pretended to pray. The Dunmer was not fond of what-ifs. It was a pointless mental venture to speculate the changes that might be, with different decisions, for what mattered to him were the choices one did make. And he had chosen, against his own desires, to stay. All under the pretext of being able to see what happened next. Was it worth it? Perhaps, perhaps not, but either way it did not matter.

Nels Llendo sighed to himself, thinking he had always pictured life as being simpler than this.

"You know..." he whispered after a long pause, unsure if he was doing what one could really call praying or just talking to himself, "If all this talk is true we could really use your help, wherever you are."

The rogue reached for the small pile of incense stalks and picked up two, lighting them on a nearby candle before standing them up in the ash-filled offering bowl. It was hard for him not to smirk the whole time; the great sly highwayman, observing a Temple ritual, not even knowing why. Maybe the back of his mind hoped some of the superstition was real and that a few trivial motions might assist his words in being heard... as silly a notion as that seemed. At worst it was just a waste of time...

In sudden revelation, he stood. This was no way to seek out anything. Sitting in a building sniffing incenses and staring at images of religious figures... was a waste of time.

Before he turned to leave the Temple behind he looked at the depiction of the Nerevarine once more, the boredom and confusion gone from his eyes and the smirk returned to his face. He could not do much against the threats that were spreading, but he knew who could. The rogue gathered his things and was out the door with renewed vigor, checking his coinpurse and making a beeline for the supply shops.

Morrowind needed the help of its heroine. She had promised him she would return, and though he believed her, she was five years overdue from her original words. That meant Nerevar reborn was in Tamriel somewhere, perhaps still battling the demons of her past. As much as he wanted to let her come to terms on her own, it was an unfortunate truth that her people were in danger. It was just a matter of finding her, wherever she was, and prayer wasn't going to do that.

He was.


End file.
